posted 11-09-2002 12:28 AM            

I was lucky enough to have visited that hanger/assembly building twice. The first time was in 2001 during the Dennis Tito launch and the second time in 2002 on the day of the Mark Shuttleworth flight. This was only a few weeks before the collapse. I have heard no official word on what caused the cave in but I could venture a guess.

When I was there the floors were clean but in the post collapse photos posted on the net you will see dirt that looks to be three or four feet deep in some places all around. The winters are very cold in Baikonur and the summers blisteringly hot and they don't have much money for heating or air conditioning. I'd say they piled dirt on the roof to act as insulation and the structure collapsed under the added weight.

The real tragedy is the loss of eight human lives but the loss to space flight history is huge. That assembly building was used for the N-1 moon rocket and later refurbished for the Energia and the Soviet Shuttle. It contained not only a fully assembled Energia, the most powerful rocket ever to make it to orbit, but also a fully assembled flight qualified shuttle matted to an Energia which was resting on its railed transport ready for the trip out to the launch pad.

The site was overwhelming. It was one of the most impressive things I have ever seen and I've seen plenty! The 2002 tour had some NASA engineers from Kennedy Space Center and even they were awe struck.

It was a complete loss and they are not going to rebuild. They couldn't even if they tried. It was irreplaceable. Also you need to remember nothing built or installed at Baikonur before 1994 belongs to Russia. It all belongs to Kazakhstan, even the historic Gagarin launch pad. The Russians only rent it.